SpaceX to Use KSC Pad 39A?
No Contest for Pad 39A? SpaceX Appears To Be Only Bidder, Space News
“Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) appears to be the only company that put in a proposal to NASA to take over one of the space shuttle’s mothballed launch pads at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida.
NASA declined to comment on how many bids it received in response to a solicitation that closed on July 5, but a survey of U.S. launch companies by SpaceNews shows only SpaceX saying it put in a proposal to take over Launch Complex 39A.”
UPDATE: Blue Origin Bids for Shuttle Launch Pad, Space News
“At least one other company is competing against Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) to take over a decommissioned space shuttle launch pad at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) here.
Privately owned Blue Origin of Kent, Washington, also responded to a NASA solicitation for proposals for Launch Pad 39A, company president Rob Meyerson told SpaceNews July 16.”
Folks:
ROFL! As SLS plods along at 39B with their ‘test flights’, SpaceX will be scurrying around KSC like crazed chipmunks building, stacking, rolling out and launching large diameter vehicles from 39A.
tinker
P.S. Just like Elon to pick up a great facility on the cheap… eg: the NUMMI plant (where they build the Tesla Motors Model S) and the McGregor test site in Texas.
So let’s say Falcon Heavy’s first scheduled launch slips by two more years. If it goes well, that means they’ll still have nearly two years of operational flights before SLS gets anywhere near pad 39B.
M80:
Since Canaveral, Vandenberg, and (probably) Brownsville will all be able to handle Falcon Heavy launches, Pad 39A must be for ‘something else’.;)
tinker
Not for this thread, I know- but I haven’t posted for a while and thought you’d be interested-.
On twitter today Elon outlined some things about Grasshopper I’m not sure were made clear before. Check his twitter feed (just before he announced Hyperloop)- he mentioned some things about Grasshopper landing profile, etc.
G:
Yes, this time they used radar in the loop, along with GPS, inertial and whatever other sensors they use. Radar would be handy to confirm the landing site is below the craft. A perimeter of radar reflectors would light up like a Christmas tree! The other part was that Grasshopper did not reach zero velocity at touchdown but was actually still decelerating at that point. Why this is so important is that if you come down at a constant rate, sideways forces have more of an effect. By decelerating during terminal landing phase, the upward force acts against those sideways forces, like wind for instance. It sounds counter-intuitive, which is why I think so many missed it, but they have more control that way.
tinker
I wonder if they would have been interested in the Titan IV launch facilities, before they were partly dismantled. Three buildings in a row with rails. Giant doors, big indoor cranes, vertical integration of boosters. Maybe they could have ran those as needed with a small crew, who knows. It was built originally to crank out the launchers in pipeline fashion.
HM:
Good point. A hanger’s a hanger. SpaceX uses generic buildings for it’s launch prep at both it’s sites.
tinker
I don’t see a lot of scurrying going around here. You guys talk like their coming off the griddle like hotcakes. I await these events with bated breath.
Notable that they would be interested in the 39A pad since it is raised so far above ground level. It seems that it would add complexity to have to move the Falcon Heavy up a ramp. There are other pads on the Air Force side of the causeway that are available and are not at the top of a ramp. And yes I know that it is not a “steep” ramp, I have seen it several times. It just seems that 39A and B were designed with the crawler/transporter in mind and I doubt that SpaceX would want to stack in the VAB and use the crawler.
“I doubt that SpaceX would want to stack in the VAB and use the crawler.“
I agree, but it’s always good to have options for the future. 10 years ago who would have predicted many of today’s aerospace situations?
Charles:
There is a point where a launch vehicle is so big that horizontal assembly becomes impractical. Also, Elon’s not ignorant of the importance of KSC as a center of exploration. The VAB and crawlers are perfect for large diameter launch vehicles. That’s what they were built for.
So, they need a launch platform all their own, a high bay for long enough to stack their stages and consumables (fuel & oxidizer) waiting at the pad when they want to launch.
What could go wrong?
What could go right?
SpaceX has already hinted that they would like to manufacture large diameter rocket stages close to where the launch pad is if possible (for so many obvious reasons :)). The area around Merritt Island could get pretty busy. The VAB will probably remain mostly assembly and rollout but further inland could get pretty busy.
There’s nothing wrong with the idea of turning KSC into a ‘commercial’ spaceport but there is oh so many ways they could get it wrong.
I think it’s good the SpaceX is getting in on the ground floor. Maybe their influence will lead down a path that does make it work. Hope so.
tinker
If I was building a tinkertanker to assemble a Mars recycler I think a Crawler would be perfect 🙂
A Crawler is how many feet wide and long again?????
I bet you could put two falcon heavies on a Crawler back to back too. Lolol falcon six pack
As magnificent as the crawlers and MLPs and VAB are, they are expensive to use and maintain and I can’t really see them fitting into SpaceX plans, which emphasize efficiency. Anything larger than the Falcon Heavy could more easily be assembled on the pad within a weather-protective mobile service tower.
Bringing the 39 pads into the equation, this feels to me like the end of an era and the start of a new one. I don’t recall having that feeling when the Shuttles were grounded. Hopefully this will be a win-win.
wouldn’t 39B be better for SpaceX?
The SLS pad?
Lolol
This would certainly give SpaceX a heavy launch platform for the ISS orbit inclination and probably puts the axe to Brownsville launch site.
But doesn’t that assume that ISS will be all/most of SpaceX’s business? I suspect that that the number of different orbital inclinations and escape trajectories they’ll use for satellites and planetary missions will only increase in the future, so other launch sites may be economical for non-ISS missions. Having come this far, I think they would keep Brownsville until/unless time shows it to be unnecessary.
Brownsville and Canaveral are essentially the same latitude.
Interesting that ATK showed little or no interest here as a possible pad for their eccentric Liberty lunker. Maybe they got the hint that nobody wants what they are selling, a Frankenbooster.
That got me wondering what happened to Liberty. They weren’t selected for CC funding. Spaceflight Now mentioned ATK was “Moving On” (Sep 2012)
http://spaceflightnow.com/n…
Though SpaceRef mentions a GAO Report that there was work on a “Liberty II” (Feb 2013)
http://spaceref.biz/2013/02…
And ATK’s main aerospace page still mentions work on Liberty
http://www.atk.com/business…
Anyone know what the scoop is?
It’s surprising there were any bids at all. Perhaps SpaceX plans to simply bulldoze the pad and just use the land. Could be a backup plan in case the Shiloh proposal is blocked to give them non-DOD launch site in Florida. No cost conscious commercial company would contemplate using the VAB, MLP, crawler or the existing service structure on the pad, and the high elevation doesn’t seem to serve any obvious purpose; it would be hard for the rail-based SpaceX erector-transporter to negotiate.
The pad area does have a lot in the way of facilities already in place and extensive in capacity that could be used or easily adapted, even if they completely ignore everything not near the pad. The cryo storage and feed equipment alone is worth having on hand if they decide to experiment in that direction; a lot cheaper than building it from scratch.
Everybody is going to be trying to challenge SpaceX more and more on price in the future, so any options/alternatives that SpaceX can’t obtain/retain along the way are going to potentially help them keep their pricing edge. This is the sort of flexibility that a private company can acquire that NASA would never be allowed to have the money for. I think is makes sense. It also puts some SpaceX people into the neighborhood where a lot of rumor and gossip fly.
I agree about the rumors and gossip… but if the USAF lets Space Florida and the FAA take over commercial launches at CCAFS, then all bets are off.
Huge lightning towers already erected at the pad? check.
Huge water tower that can dump tons of water at the pad if needed? check.
Escape facilities for any personnel at the pad? check.
etc.
Make big time congress/senate critters (ie.customers) happy that one of their vendors is helping to maintain KSC? Check!
Maintenance costs greatly outweigh construction costs after even a few years, and much of the equipment at LC-39 is old and requires a lot of maintenance. Is SpaceX offering to maintain any of the government equipment? LC-39B has lightning towers. The escape system and lighning arresting tower at LC-39A are part of the Shuttle FSS that SpaceX cannot use. The deluge system may be partly usable but designed for SRBs and vastly overbuilt for Falcon, even the Saturn V used a pumped water spray with ground-level tanks. The hypergol facilities may be usable by SpaceX but are similarly vastly larger than Falcon requires. The LOX tank may be usable but does not have a refrigeration system. Currently SpaceX does not plan to use LH2. The big question is the incline, which is too steep for a rail-based erector-transporter. Perhaps SpaceX will spend the money to build a much longer and more gradual ramp, or perhaps it will reduce the pad elevation. There is no way I can see the SpaceX would use the crawlers or MLPs (taking a full day for rollout and with very limited weather protection on the pad).
Elon Musk is always moving forward. Nuff said.
I don’t think anything will come of this. Using a NASA facility like 39A has too many drawbacks. The hardware is obsolete, and the engineering that defines the system configurations is so out-dated and poorly maintained as to make sustaining impossible. Reusing old crap is just not worth it. It would be cheaper in the long run to build new somewhere else.